


Plain Sight

by Anaphora_Borealis



Category: Captain America (Movies)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Getting Together, M/M, Multi
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-10-08
Updated: 2017-10-08
Packaged: 2019-01-10 09:40:22
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,184
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12296487
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Anaphora_Borealis/pseuds/Anaphora_Borealis
Summary: After Civil War, while the rest of Team Cap lie low in Wakanda, Sam, Steve and Bucky keep moving to throw off the authorities.





	Plain Sight

They fall into it, easy as pie, and Steve finds himself realizing it one afternoon when they're all curled up on the couch together. 

It makes his eyes sting and his chest tight and of course it's the sniper who notices his breathing first.

“Steve?” Bucky says, and his voice is concerned but gentle.

Steve shuts his eyes and burrows down into the warmth of the cushions and blanket, hiding his face in Bucky's neck while the TV plays quietly and their coffee steams on the table.

“S'okay,” he says.

~

“It works,” Bucky says, unshaven and haggard but smiling tiredly, and Steve can barely believe his ears, his eyes. “It works, read the list.”

Steve can't – has practised because Bucky asked him to, but can't, can't do it, and he shakes his head.

“Bucky,” he says, and Bucky smiles a sad, fond little thing, sets his palm against Steve's cheek.

“Just say them after me,” he says, leaning close as Steve's strength dissolves. “Zhelaniye.”

Steve looks down, closes his eyes.

“Zhe...” he whispers.

Steve doesn't make it through the words, not a one. He shakes his head and wills his voice to be steady but Bucky doesn't stop. 

Another word, and another, and another, and Steve finds it harder to breathe with each one, fear and love and desperate, desperate hope welling up inside him.

“Semnadtsat,” Bucky tells him, still going, eyes still clear, still smiling.

“Bucky,” Steve answers, cannot look at him, his voice – that name – a low, broken thing.

By the time Bucky murmurs, “Adjin,” Steve's hand is clasped tight over his mouth, his eyes screwed shut though it doesn't stop the dampness on his lashes, and he feels Bucky tug him close but is beyond speech by then, feeling nothing of the man he is and every bit the man he was as Bucky pulls him in, his one arm spanning the width of Steve's back.

“Gruzovoy Vagonov,” he says against Steve's ear. 

And they are still, and close, and Steve buries his head against Bucky's shoulder where Bucky holds him tight. 

~

When everything starts to go better, it's a miracle, and Steve doesn't believe it for the longest time. Which is why the knowledge of it is sometimes overwhelming.

They're not who they really are – old covert ops skills and undercover memories help them stay off the radar, off the grid. Steve suspects Natasha knows, but he suspects Natasha will always know.

~

“Your boy drank all the O.J again,” Sam tells him, and Steve just laughs.

He's still shaky some days, today feels like it might be one of those days, but his vision blurs and he's still laughing. 

“Man,” Sam says, but it's not unkind. “You are such a sucker.”

“Yeah,” Steve says as he swipes at his eyes.

~

“Can't you just get along?” Steve sighs, looking at the two of them – Sam beside him and Bucky in the rearview.

“Can't you jack a bigger car?” Sam answers. 

“Can't you shut up,” Bucky says, and Steve rolls his eyes. 

Bucky passes out protein bars. They're headed to Belarus. It's going to be a long drive.

~

 _“I'm made,”_ Bucky whispers, hushed and frantic in Steve's ear, and Steve runs, runs as fast as he can and he's a wreck these days, Bucky's all too quick to admonish him.

“Please,” he says, and it hurts to speak as the wind rushes past and his throat aches, “please, please.”

 _“Steve, I'm...I'm sorry...”_ Bucky says, and it's the middle of the night and the streets are narrow but it's out before he can stop it.

“No!” he yells, stumbling as he realizes what this means, his feet pounding the cobbled street, lungs burning, he's not going to get there in time. “No!!”

There's a noise like breaking glass over the line, a noise like firecrackers, and Steve gasps through the knifelike sharpness in his chest, feels his face screw up even as he runs, even as he knows it's too late.

“Please, please, no,” he moans, choking, and then there's a sound like wind, like falling – rushing, whistling air and noise in Steve's ear.

 _“I got him,”_ Sam's voice says, and Steve has to stop, has to slow to a halt and grab the nearest building and he can't breathe, he can't breathe, they're in the air, it's all right. 

_“I could've taken him,”_ Bucky's voice says, and Steve's knees go weak.

 _“I know, man. Where are you, Steve?”_ Sam asks, nobody calls him Cap any more, and Steve ducks into the nearest shadows and lands on all fours and hangs his head and can't breathe, his lungs making noise he isn't controling. _“Hold on, Steve, I'm coming to you.”_

They don't go back to Paris.

~

“God, I wish I was back in Siberia,” Bucky mutters, sweat-soaked, his stump in the shade because the window's open to get some air in, and Steve's already near burned himself on the remaining metal once when it caught the sun for too long.

“I wish you were back in Siberia, too,” Sam says, throwing him a water bottle, and Bucky catches it and then flips him off.

~

Bucky stands close in the monsoon rain and shuts his eyes as water streams from his face. 

He leans forward and rubs his cheek against Steve's and sighs softly. Steve shuts his eyes and breathes him in.

~

“Shit,” Bucky whispers, dropping the knife, and Sam looks over at him where he stands at the kitchenette counter.

Bucky sticks his finger in his mouth and raises his eyebrows when Sam looks over. _What?_

“You cut your finger?” Sam says, and Bucky rolls his eyes so Sam snorts. “You need a _hand_?”

Bucky screws up his face and pretends to laugh.

"A-ha-ha," he says, mocking.

“I'll do it, Buck,” Steve says, and he puts down a magazine written in a language he barely understood anyway, and goes to help.

~

Sam leans into Steve and bumps him with his body, and Steve pretends he's swayed by it.

They don't say anything when Sam doesn't move away again, and Steve only settles his cheek against the top of Sam's head when Sam rests his on Steve's shoulder.

~

“We learned these our first time in Europe,” Bucky says, his voice quiet in the late night, lying flat beside Steve. “Didn't we?”

“I did,” Steve answers, his breath making clouds as they gaze up at the night sky. 

They keep moving, and nobody will find them because they don't want to be found. Steve can't remember the last time he saw a night so clear.

“Couldn't get me to pick it up, huh?” Bucky asks, and Steve points up at the stars.

“Not a chance of that, Buck, you were the one who taught me,” he answers. “Remember that one?”

“Yeah,” Bucky says and, when Steve looks at him with a grin for confirmation, he finds Bucky staring at him instead of the sky. “That one's the Sun.”

~

Sam stares at the half cupcake left in the wrapper with his name on it.

“I hate you so much,” he says, to the empty room.

~

Steve's reading on the couch during their two day sojurn in Ontario, his back against Sam's arm, when Sam takes the book from his hands.

Steve frowns and looks back over his shoulder and suddenly Sam is very close, and very warm, and Steve notices his cologne. 

It's been a while since he's considered the way his body feels – they've had a lot to deal with, and a lot to run from. The phone doesn't ring, they don't get any mail. Steve will buy a paper from time to time but they live like hermits otherwise.

“Hey,” Sam says softly, and he leans forward to bring his upper body around Steve's arm.

Steve turns to face him as best he can and they're twisted around each other but Sam tilts his head, and Steve glances at his mouth-

“Steve!” Bucky yells, and Sam pulls away so fast Steve nearly falls off the couch.

He slams the door open and dumps the groceries, and Steve tries to figure out what happened as Sam says,

“You pick up my donuts?” and Buck says,

“No,” and puts down waffles instead.

~

Bucky takes Steve by surprise one afternoon when Steve is making shitty coffee in the thing the motel provided.

He steps up behind him and slides his arm under Steve's, and he rests his head between Steve's shoulder blades. Steve thinks he feels the press of Bucky's mouth a moment later, but then Bucky moves away and Steve is cold, and he doesn't dare say anything else.

~

“I...” Steve says softly, and then he turns his head to look at Sam. “Sam, you know I love you.”

Sam's eyebrows raise, and then a slow smile begins and he says,

“That so?” but it's not that easy - his smile fades when he takes in Steve's expression, and he leans forward, slides his hand across Steve's back. “Steve?”

“Bucky...” he says, and the name hangs in the air while Steve stares at his knees, and Sam breathes deeply and nods slowly.

“You love him, too, huh?”

Steve looks up at him, searches Sam's face.

“I- Sam, I, I want you so much,” and there's the surprise on Sam's face again, “but I don't know how to...”

Sam nods, strokes his hand over Steve's face. 

“You two were a thing, huh?” he says. 

Steve nods.

“We were...like you and me. Brothers. Perfect. In love, Sam.”

Sam eases his palm around the back of Steve's neck and pulls, and Steve goes willingly because he's longed for this for almost two years now.

Sam kisses in a way that makes Steve melt, his lips soft and his tongue skilful, and his fingers work slow circles in Steve's hair as he turns his head this way and that. He strokes down Steve's chest with his other hand, smooths his palm over Steve's pectoral and around him, and Steve reaches for Sam, too, winding his arms around Sam's neck.

When they break apart, Sam holds onto him tight and says,

“If you want me, and he's...”

Sam sighs and shakes his head.

“I can wait,” he says. “I'll wait.”

Steve pulls back and stares at him, searches Sam's face and hopes some of the gratitude shows in his eyes. It must, because Sam smiles gently and squeezes him tight when Steve feels his composure wobble.

“Sam,” he whispers into Sam's neck, and Sam strokes the back of Steve's head with his hand.

“I love you too, baby,” he says. “It's gonna be okay.”

~

There's somebody moving in their apartment. They can see them through the windows and Bucky says it's his fault, says he's the one who asked to stay so long. He says he's sorry, gets sad about the books Steve's leaving behind, but Steve shakes his head.

“They're nothing,” he says. “Not compared to everything else.”

They move away through the shadows and then they get in their car and leave. 

It's a miracle they were all out at the same time, otherwise they'd have been caught by now. This will be the last time they stay somewhere over a week. 

~

“Get your foot off the table,” Bucky says, so Sam puts his other foot up on the table.

~

They don't go to Russia. They go to Germany.

“Who's gonna look for us in Germany?” Steve says softly when Bucky gives him a look.

“We should go to Leipzig,” Bucky says. “You trash an airport, nobody expects you back.”

They go to Leipzig.

~

They visit old haunts for that reason. They even think about Brooklyn, but that's pushing it a little.

Instead, they go to London for a little while. They visit Peggy.

“I'm sorry,” Bucky says to her headstone, and Steve pulls him close and presses a kiss to his temple.

“No,” Steve murmurs. 

~

“I'm not ready for Azzano,” Bucky says, while they're staying in Avignon.

Steve reaches out and takes his hand, squeezes.

“Me either,” he says. 

Sam doesn't say anything. Not this time.

~

“Man, you're stealing my underwear now?” Bucky asks, and Sam shrugs.

“I needed a cloth, I spilled-”

“Man, _fuck_ you.”

“Bucky,” Steve admonishes, and they both of them look at him.

“What?” Bucky says, with a fading smile, and Sam looks equally confused.

Steve looks between them and, slowly, shakes his head.

“I...nothing?” Steve says, bemused. 

They turn back, and Bucky flings his coffee-soaked underwear at Sam.

“Jesus!”

~

Steve wakes in the middle of the night in Portugal. He's sleeping in boxers only and, for a moment, the creeping sensation that wakes him has him scanning his belongings on the floor for the nearest weapon.

There's someone in the room with him and, for a moment, he thinks it's Natasha. Lethal within moments and perfectly silent at all times. He can feel his heart rate kick up, and he wonders if trying to reason with her would help any of them at all. He wonders if fighting her would make enough noise to serve as an alarm.

It's not until a substantial weight crawls onto the bed behind him that Steve recognizes it for Bucky.

“Buck?” he says softly, and Bucky doesn't get under the bedclothes, doesn't say a thing for the longest time.

He spoons up behind Steve and Steve feels his stump come to rest against the top of his arm as Bucky presses his lips to the back of Steve's neck.

He's eleven and barely lucid, he's sixteen and dying of pneumonia, he's eighteen and crying silently into his pillow because his mother's gone. He's nineteen and biting his lip, twenty-two and they're both staying silent for fear of the neighbours hearing, he's twenty-six in Italy and he remembers Bucky's hand warm and tight.

“I still love you,” Bucky says, and Steve rolls back a little to look over his shoulder. “I know you love Sam-”

“Bucky,” he says, “Bucky, sweetheart, I love you too, I'll always love you.”

Bucky's mouth twists and his eyes are wide and glittering.

“I don't know if I can give you what you need.”

Steve pulls away, turns over and holds him close.

“Bucky, you're here,” he whispers. “You've given me so much more than I could ever ask for. We don't have to cross those bridges yet. Ever. Not if you're not ready.”

Bucky's flesh arm comes up and holds him back.

“I love you,” Steve tells him, and Bucky nods. 

~

“I swear to God,” Sam says, eating his donut, “you buy hazelnut creamer again and I'll end you.”

“Says the man who can't get O.J with pulp to save his life.”

Steve smiles as he turns the page of his newspaper. 'O.J.' 'I’ll end you.' They're both picking phrases up off each other these days.

“Steve, will you tell your boy-”

“Come on!” Bucky interrupts. “Steve, you know he doesn't-”

“I,” Steve answers, feeling himself grin, “am not getting involved.”

~

They travel. They move, they keep moving, they buy enough groceries to see them through.

~

“I'm jacking the next car,” Bucky says.

“Hell no,” Sam answers.

“Shut up,” says Steve.

~

“You're an idiot,” Bucky says. 

Sam slipped because he was worried, because he was running to Steve's defense, and Bucky keeps right on telling him off the whole time he's dressing the not-substantial-at-all injury, all the way to Miskolc. 

“Hey,” Sam says, and Steve glances in the rearview to look at them.

Bucky looks pained.

“It's okay,” Sam tells him, and Bucky looks murderous.

“You're an idiot,” he repeats.

~

It's Steve's turn to get the groceries and he picks up Sam's donuts and creamer, Bucky's pulpy O.J and hazelnut nonsense. He's halfway sick to death of them arguing but he'll never really be tired of it.

He fumbles the key card to their cabin and pushes the door open – the foyer area, where their coats and shoes lie currently, is as good a place as any to set the groceries down.

He doesn't hear them arguing, and figures either one or both of them are sleeping, so he doesn't walk in yelling 'hello,' or calling out for them.

Which is how he finds them. His mind doesn't immediately process what he's seeing, and there's a mortifying moment where it understands the physical but not the implication.

Sam is sitting on the couch with his head all the way back against the back cushions, one foot up on the coffee table, and both hands roaming Bucky's back, around to his chest and stomach, back up into his hair. Bucky's kneeling astride him, face to face, and his body is bowed over Sam, his hand planted firmly against the back of the couch. 

They're kissing, eyes closed, mouths open, and it's fast and hard and dirty – Steve can see their tongues occasionally, and they're both so far from still, moaning and humming and rocking against each other, rutting and pressing close and drawing back and-

Bucky's head snaps up and he stares at Steve, mouth open and wet, chest heaving, and Sam only takes a second to catch up, looking first up at Bucky and then, when his head whips around, over at Steve. 

Steve feels sick, feels his eyes prickle, his breath come short and it's his own fault, it's his own fault, he put them both off, made them both wait and they're so close these days – wandering around in underwear, sharing beds and meals – they're both so good and kind and beautiful and he should have known, should have seen.

“Steve,” Bucky says, and his voice is rough and slow as he leans back, as Sam's foot comes down from the coffee table.

Sam holds onto his waist because Bucky's always off-balance now, but he looks like he's starting to panic, and Steve takes a step back and tries not to reel.

Bucky's lips are swollen, his pupils wide, his hair a mess. Sam's just the same, and Steve looks between them, his body aching. Their hands look so warm, their bodies look so close, he longs for someone whose thighs bracket his own, someone whose hands roam his skin.

He knows how Sam tastes when Sam kisses, knows how Bucky tastes when Bucky kisses, and it's been so _long_.

God, they look so strong, so warm and his body aches.

Steve feels betrayed, feels sick, feels absurdly ready to cry and he knows it's his fault, knows he should have said something but the both of them, together, the two people he loves more than anything in the world, and they want each other instead of him.

He can't stay. 

He turns around and he's dizzy, steadies himself on the doorframe and goes to leave, and he hears them speaking behind them, only hears his name, but he doesn't want them to say it now.

“Steve,” Sam says, and there's shuffling on the couch, shuffling and thudding. “Steve!”

He's at the front door when he breaks, when he gasps for breath and tries the handle but it locked and he doesn't have the coordination to go for the lock as well.

“Steve Grant Rogers, don't you fucking dare!” Bucky yells, and it's so _Bucky_ that Steve squeezes his eyes shut and bites back a sob.

And then Bucky's arm is pulling him back from the door and Sam's hands are on his shoulders and he's turned around and pushed back against the door and he pushes Sam away, pushes Bucky back.

“Don't,” he says, and his voice is unsteady and he shakes his head. “Don't touch me, just...”

They look at each other, _Sam and Bucky look at each other_ and then move backwards together.

“Steve,” Sam says, “I know how this looks-”

“Don't!” Steve tells him. “Don't lie to me, Sam, please, _please_ don't.”

“Steve,” Bucky says, and Steve glares at him.

“I got no right,” he says. “I got no right to be angry, I got no right to either of you and I love you, both of you and I'm glad-” he chokes. “I'm glad you're... _happy_ but I can't- I _can't_ -”

“Steve, that's not how it is-”

“Steve, you gotta listen to me-”

“-listen, man, let me explain it to you-”

“-it's not like that, you have to-”

“ _Stop talking!_ ” he answers, and he doesn't mean to shout but it comes out so loud and he wants to scream.

The silence rings around them, and he covers his mouth with his hand, looks down so he doesn't have to look at them.

“I'm leaving,” he says, and he turns around and gets halfway before Bucky, who's still so much stronger than Steve remembers, turns him back and pins him to the door.

“No you're not,” he says, and Steve tries so hard not to kiss back when Bucky kisses him, tries so hard not to sink into it and let himself get lost but he tastes-

He tastes of Sam.

He shoves Bucky backward a moment later and Bucky still has hold of his shirt, doesn't go as far as Steve wants and end up tugging him forward with the momentum.

“Let go,” Steve moans, and Sam comes up alongside him, slides his hand on the back of his head and cradles his skull, holds him still.

“We tried to wait for you,” he says, “we tried to wait for you, Steve, it's not-”

“I know,” Steve says, and he can feel his face screw up with the effort of keeping it together. “I know, I...I kept you waiting and if you're _happy_ then-”

“No,” Bucky says, jerking him closer, “no, you _listen_ , Steve, it ain't _like_ that, Sam said to wait until you came back from the store and I couldn't wait, you didn't-”

“We didn't elect to have each other 'cause you couldn't make up your mind,” Sam says, clarifying, “I'm saying we _made up_ our minds. There's three of us and I love you both and he loves us both and if you can love both of us, Steve-”

“I couldn't help it, Stevie,” Bucky says, and his knees go weak. “It was me, I couldn't wait, he's just so-”

“Barnes, you gotta cool it,” Sam tells him, and Bucky stops, looks at Sam and then lets go of Steve's shirt. “Steve.”

Steve still can't breathe, and Sam gets a little more in front of him.

“I know what you think, man, but we talked about it-”

“Both of us.”

“-and we both want you. We both love you. It's just Frosty the Impatient Asshole over here couldn't wait for you to come home to get started.”

“Fuck you,” Bucky answers, but he grabs for Sam and kisses him briefly, and then he wraps his arm around Steve's neck and kisses him hard, leaning up to press themselves full length against him.

“What?” Steve gasps, but Bucky kisses him again.

Sam strokes Steve's hair and then his spine, encouraging them closer, and Steve yanks himself back, hand against Bucky's chest and says, 

“Sam-”

So Sam kisses him instead, turns his head with both hands and strokes his neck and his head, and Sam tastes of Bucky too.

“You're cheating, Sammy; just 'cause ya got two hands.”

Steve's still got one hand on Bucky's chest, and he finds himself grabbing a fistful of Sam's shirt with the other as a laugh bubbles up in his throat. 

Relief feels like a concussion, makes him feel like he's pitching sideways and falling off a building and-

“Mmh, wait,” he says, and Sam pulls back, searches his face.

Steve looks between the two of them, Sam's earnest patience, Bucky's open anxiety.

“What...” Steve says. “What do we...”

“You come sit down,” Sam says. “See how it plays out with us. Okay?”

Steve nods dazedly, lets Sam start walking him forward and, to his surprise, Bucky's the one who's fussing around him, moving things out of the way and sorting the cushions on the couch. Sam sits down with Steve, tugs his arm until Steve leans forward, and then wraps him in a hug.

Bucky sits down behind him and presses the front of his torso to the entire length of Steve's back, mouth against the back of his shoulder and wraps his arm around Sam and Steve.

“Stevie,” he says, and Steve kind of gasps into Sam's shirt and tries to calm himself down and Sam and Bucky just soothe and speak softly and sit for a while.

~

They do nothing that first day but sit wrapped up in each other. Steve's too fragile, although Sam and Bucky don't say so and Steve won't admit it by himself. 

They spend the whole evening on the couch, they sleep on the same bed, and Steve clings to Bucky while Sam plasters himself to Steve's back. Bucky lies on the right hand side of the bed, so he can get his one arm around Steve's shoulders.

They leave early the next morning and Sam drives while Steve breathes softly in the passenger seat, out cold for the first time in days.


End file.
